Ma Belle Pensee
by Adele Elisabeth
Summary: Lucius Malfoy remembers. (LM!PP, reference to HP!PP)


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Author's Notes: This is one of the weirder things I've ever written…really, really weird…it's not at all how I intended for it to turn out…so if you hate it, please don't flame me. I know it's fucked up. 

Ma Belle Pensee

By Adele Elisabeth

Lucius Malfoy remembers. 

Pansy Parkinson was my son's friend. She was every inch the pampered princess, and a rather vocal, opinionated young woman besides. She was not someone I considered _truly_ worthy of my notice. Oh, certainly her family was rich, her blood ran true, and she was rather attractive…

So was Narcissa, and I didn't consider her to be worthy, either. Sadly, I had had need of an heir. 

My son was not quite my greatest mistake, but he came close, as did his mother. 

No. My greatest mistake was inviting the Parkinsons to my birthday celebrations. 

The first words I heard Pansy speak that were _not_ prompted by her father or mother were rather slyly spoken, an inquiry as to just what age I was in fact turning, as the invitation had not specified. 

"It is not polite to ask after someone's age, Miss Parkinson." 

"Really, Mr Malfoy? I was under the impression that that applied only to women of a certain age. Thank you terribly for enlightening me." The little minx was laughing at me behind bright blue eyes, and I can't say I cared much for it. 

"You are a very impertinent little girl." I observed. "That is, you will discover, unwise." 

"Maybe, maybe not. We'll see." She paused, and tilted her head slightly. Her thoughtful gaze was a tad unsettling, but perhaps this was merely because I was unused to such…focus from one such as herself. When Pansy looked at someone, she focused solely on them. It's a wonderful thing, once you're accustomed to it. "I think I shall be forward, and ask you to dance." 

"How very improper of you." 

"If you like, you can pretend you thought of it first." 

"Why do you want to dance with me?" 

"Because Draco won't like it." Her smile was one of the coldest I'd seen on someone so young -- she was the only other person I can recall with such a capacity for casual cruelty is myself. I'd seen a smile like that before -- in my mirror. 

"And why would you wish to provoke my son, Miss Parkinson? I gather your parents are quite keen for you to marry him." I raised an eyebrow. 

"He seems to have decided that because of my family's ambition, I'm some sort of possession of his. I'm having quite a lot of fun disabusing him of this notion. I think he could use a reminder." 

"Do you think it wise to be telling this to his father?" 

"Do you think it wise to be throwing a party full of known Death Eaters in the middle of a war you're on the losing side of?"

"You go too far, Miss Parkinson." 

"I think I go just far enough, Mr Malfoy." 

I took her hand, leading her out -- she was an exquisite dancer, unsurprisingly. When she deemed herself close enough, she murmured in my ear, "I know where the Order is going to strike next." 

"It was you who told them where to find Rosier, wasn't it?" I tightened my grip on her wrist -- hard enough to bruise, I know for a fact. She just smiled at me. "Have you no loyalties, child?" 

"I'm no child, and the only person I'm loyal to is _me_. I'm coming out of this war alive, Mr Malfoy, one way or another. Do you want to know or not?" 

"I could kill you now for what you've done. And the Order would be no more merciful than I. How do you expect to survive, playing both sides against the other?" 

"The Order won't kill me," she breathed into my ear. "Harry Potter is a fool. Too easily led by a pretty face. He'd follow me into the fire -- and pull me out of it." 

I didn't realize at first that that was her intention -- to find someone on both sides of the fence that would protect her when the time came. She made Potter love her, and then she turned her charm on me. I suspect she found me harder to manipulate than him, however. That was her game -- to make both sides think her loyal, and if she was found out, well, she had friends in high places. 

Pansy Persephone Parkinson always played to win. 

I was never sure why she simply _told_ me her plan in the beginning -- though I note she never once said her intention was to make me Potter's opposite. I caught on, but…

I will never know why I let her. Curiosity, perhaps? To see if she'd actually do it? 

To see if she'd actually succeed…

She didn't, in the end. 

She misjudged Potter's 'self-sacrificing' kick. I'm told he cried as he shoved the knife through her heart. 

Voldemort is under the misapprehension that she was loyal to him. 

It will serve my purpose well enough; I have no reason to enlighten him. 


End file.
